


Status Report

by Zarla



Category: Star Control
Genre: Bickering, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-01-24
Updated: 2008-01-24
Packaged: 2017-10-06 04:32:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/49690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zarla/pseuds/Zarla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>DAX comes to visit ZEX after he gets put in the hospital by some anti-human VUX. Arguing over whether banging humans is ethical ensues! This is all very serious business.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Status Report

**Author's Note:**

> This'll probably make more sense if you read [this](http://zarla.livejournal.com/258412.html) first.

It was hard to see him like this.

During the War, conflict was primarily restricted to intership battle in Truespace... nothing this close and personal. His Admiral had had brushes with death before, it came with the territory, but he'd never truly been _injured_. He certainly hadn't required medical attention.

It didn't suit him, and he hardly thought being attacked and nearly beaten to death by a gang of thugs an appropriate thing to happen to such a war hero. ZEX was above all that...he should have been above all that.

Instead, he sat in a hospital bed, his head wreathed with bandages and some feelers, those that hadn't been torn off completely, trapped in splints.

Weakness did not suit the Admiral. It didn't seem right.

His eye turned to DAX from what he was reading, and ZEX tried gamely to wave his unharmed head feelers in greeting.

"DAX! I was wondering when you would come and visit me." The Admiral put his reading material to one side. DAX moved from the doorframe and took his seat beside the bed, as the routine went each day. "How go things?"

"Fine." DAX studied his Admiral's face. It looked unnatural, the bandages against his skin that wrapped above his eye and around the back of his head where the initial blow had fallen, and a few smaller patches marked his trunk. The memory of the attack came unpleasantly to him, and DAX forced it away. "There's not much to report."

"Surely there's something, DAX," ZEX said in a very matter-of-fact way, as if that made it true. "I can't imagine it's been completely boring, has it?"

DAX knew what ZEX wanted to hear, and instead decided to make him wait. "The High Council has yet to respond to your statement..."

"I'm not surprised." ZEX glared at the sheets, his few moving head tendrils rising and quivering. The effect just wasn't the same without all of them extended to full length, increasing the illusion of one's size and thoroughly stating one's anger and frustration. DAX turned to look at something else. "I thought it right to at least state my future intentions and how I felt about the whole matter. Not that it makes much difference, in the end. Knowing them, they'll just use it against me. They're blind to reason...I thought I was being fairly civil, given what's been going on around here lately."

"They want to arrest and execute you." DAX kept his voice neutral. "They won't take no for an answer. That's not how these things work, Admiral."

"Yes, yes." ZEX waved off DAX's words, a touch of annoyance still in his tone. "I know. But they have to give up sometime."

Again, the memory of the attack, could still hear that dreadful scream and DAX pushed it down again, his head feelers twisting against each other momentarily. Such an ugly thing to happen and the punishment would not fit the crime, there'd be no justice. He knew that.

More importantly, he knew that this might not be the last time.

"What are you so worried about?"

Ugh...the Admiral had been watching him. He'd already brought this up before, but since he asked...

"They don't have to attack us directly. This could happen again."

"You're so paranoid, DAX."

"Who's to say that the next physician on call here could be loyal to them or to us? It's-"

"And what would you suggest we do?" ZEX looked at him, his gaze appraising. "Discharge everyone here? Arrest everyone until we find out who's truly loyal? Lock myself away from everyone to make sure I'm safe in my own ship? Ridiculous."

He could be so stubborn sometimes. "You can't deny that this is dangerous, that there are individuals here who want to hurt you and will possibly try to do so again."

"Then I'll be more careful from now on. They merely caught me by surprise."

"If you took precautions-"

"Like what? A bodyguard? How would I know_ they_ were loyal? How do I know anyone is loyal, except those that are already close to me?"

DAX touched one of his head feelers with his tongue, preparing himself for the inevitable response to what he had to say. "If you stopped indulging that human..."

"Oh DAX." ZEX rolled his eye and stuck out his tongue.

"I'm serious. It's dangerous, Admiral-"

"I've heard this all before! Always the same lecture and I always give you the same answer. I won't stop, not now. Not when I actually have something this amazing, when I actually have this chance." There, that particular shine in his eye when he got to talking about his... preferences. DAX sighed. "I can't abandon it, I _won't_ abandon it. I've fought for the right to pursue this kind of relationship without persecution and I won't stop now that I actually have it."

"It blinds you, Admiral." ZEX turned away from him, visibly annoyed, but DAX didn't back down. "It's dangerous and it's causing problems, not just for you but for everyone-"

"What should I care what anyone thinks!" ZEX snapped. "It's all the same-"

"It's not the same, Admiral, and you know that." DAX hardened his tone. "You're being childish. There are lives here at stake, spent to protect you and this world, and you're throwing them away for your own benefit. It's selfish."

"I-" ZEX paused for a moment to calm himself, then he leaned back with a sigh, his head feelers lowering. "I just can't...I can't let him go. I can't just...after all this time, this was all that I wanted, I can't...I can't lose that. I can't let him go."

"I know, Admiral." And DAX did know this, because they'd gone over this countless times before. "But he makes you careless...it's dangerous. He incites others against you. You have to make a decision."

"There's no decision to be made." ZEX looked back to DAX again. "I just have to be cautious."

"You tell me that you will be, but you forget whenever you see him. And what about those who died to keep you here..."

"They swore they'd obey me when they came here to serve under me. The High Council has no reason to attack me, they have no justification. I've done nothing wrong." ZEX's voice tightened, his arm curling. "They attacked me for no reason, with little provocation, to satisfy their own needs and agendas. I defended myself. I didn't choose to attack them, they attacked _me_."

"Admiral..."

"I refuse to be responsible for the bigoted actions of others, for their poor decisions that make them waste precious lives trying to get rid of me. I'm not responsible for their decisions."

"It could stop...if you just stopped-"

"Do you _know_ that?" ZEX looked at him again, and DAX felt his head feelers lower just slightly. "The High Council has hated me for years, despised me even. A public embarrassment, the VUX populace's secret shame. Even if I did refuse my dear human, sent him away the next time he visited forever, what good would it do? The damage is done, and even if I 'repented' which I have no intention of doing since I've done nothing _wrong_, they would not stop until I'm dead. I refuse."

"I understand how you feel, Admiral, but..."

ZEX kept his eye on him.

"I don't like it. It's dangerous...I don't approve."

"I didn't think you would, to be honest."

There was a slight pause, awkward, then ZEX spoke again, his tone lighter.

"So, has anything else happened lately?"

As much as he was loathe to say it...

"Your human came by again."

"Did he?" An enraptured sigh. "Oh, Captain! I'm so glad that I'm still in his thoughts. I'm sure he's terribly concerned about me."

"I told him to stop loitering around and go make himself useful." DAX flicked his tongue at the momentary flurry of indignant motion from the Admiral's head tentacles.

"DAX! You're so rude! I told you to be more civil to him."

"He's irritating. Always coming by and asking questions...it's a wonder he gets anything done."

"Asking questions about me, or about you?" ZEX flicked his tongue in return. "I can see why he'd get on your nerves, if it's the latter."

DAX rolled his eye, his head feelers twitching up in annoyance. "Both of you like to talk too much."

"You don't talk enough." Pleased that the tables were turned. "You're need to open up, DAX."

"I'd rather not."

"What did you and my human talk about?"

"He asked after you again. I told him you were fine and to stop bothering me."

"DAX." Chiding, but his tone evened out quickly enough. "Anything else?"

"He tried to ask me about myself, but there's not much to tell."

"There's not much you want to tell."

"So you say."

A pleased laugh, and DAX sighed. He hadn't intended to let that slip. His Admiral knew him well enough to know what it meant.

"And...?"

"I told him that I didn't like what you two were doing."

"DAX-"

"He didn't seem to want to stop either. You're both stubborn and foolish, it seems."

ZEX relaxed visibly. "I thought for a moment..."

"I doubt I could get him to leave you now, Admiral," DAX said, his voice soft. "He seems quite attached to you, or at least, to what you do to him."

"You're so cynical." ZEX shot him an admonishing stare, then leaned back. "So this is something more than...he's concerned about me..." ZEX paused, then gave a deep, loving sigh. "Oh, how this feels, DAX! Mmm! I wish I could share it with you, it's amazing. Ah, my human love..."

Like a lovesick youth, completely infatuated with their first mate. Hardly matched the ZEX he knew, at all, and he sighed. Poise, elegance, dignity...all of it lost in a swirl of gushing compliments and insipid, childish fantasies. He didn't like this transformation, this apparently unseen side of his Admiral that he'd never suspected could exist.

But...this was out of his control at this point. All he could do was handle what happened as a result the best he could. The only concerns for the future that ZEX entertained were his fantasies of mating for life to the human as if he were a VUX, what kind of reception and party he would throw and managing all of their numerous sexual liasons. Meanwhile, he was blissfully unaware to the rumblings of discontent among the less tolerant of his crew, to the actual cost that his relationship would have on his world, on the life he had established... they'd lived in peace on Cerenkov for almost twenty years, and those with the Admiral and those with the High Council were beginning to take up sides, and tensions were rising.

So blind, so stubborn, so childish, but...DAX had never seen him this happy, and some part of him knew that he couldn't separate ZEX and the human Captain now. ZEX would never forgive him, if he even allowed it.

DAX knew he was just going to have to deal with the fallout from this himself. He'd have to protect him as best he could because when the Admiral was like this...ZEX saw nothing but that human, and there were so many that wanted to take advantage of that. DAX wouldn't allow it to happen again, waiting by his side anxiously to make sure that he was still breathing, or watching him fall and cry out in pain under another assault. It would not happen again, not as long as he was here.

It was up to DAX now, and he would gladly do all he could for that cause. He'd protect his Admiral with his life if he had to, and he was fairly sure that he might have to do it soon.

ZEX was still going on and on about that human. DAX reached out and curled his arm around the Admiral's, who finally stopped talking and turned to look at him.

He let the silence go on for a few moments, staring at the Admiral's eye while his head feelers twitched back and forth.

"Don't make me die for you unless it's for a good reason."

ZEX blinked, then returned the gesture, twisting their arms together. He sounded somewhat confused.

"Of course."

It didn't make DAX feel any better.


End file.
